Promoting Pro-Environmental Behaviour in Groups and Organisations

Abstract

This chapter focuses on special characteristics of groups as targets for interventions. Groups can be found in families, at the work place, in education settings, and in leisure activities, among other arenas. It discusses the differences between individual, household, and group behaviour, drawing on social psychological findings about group processes such as establishing social norms, group polarisation, diffusion of responsibility, majority and minority influences, risky shift, in-group/out-group phenomena, and group competition. The chapter presents group-centred intervention strategies that target the behaviour of people in organisations and presents evidence for their effectiveness. Strategies steered by external actors as well as participatory intervention strategies that include the target group in the design of the intervention program are discussed with their advantages and disadvantages. The chapter also looks at how an organisation both provides a structure to the individuals within it and itself is a construction of the individuals forming it.